Desert World Rebirth by Lyn Gala

main gate. The engine echoed against the smooth walls until they approached the far end. Temar’s farm was closest to the gate, and as they entered the main valley, Shan could see a number of workers walking the fields and sinking water rods into the ground every six or seven feet. Naite was walking the closest furrow, and he turned as they came down the path.
    From a distance, he looked friendly enough. He stopped to talk to another worker, offering a slap on the shoulder before he handed them his water rod and stepped over a line of potato plants. However, something in his body language still set Shan on edge. Unless he missed his guess, Naite was not happy.
    He strode across the bare ground and waited as Shan negotiated the narrow trail that led down to the valley floor. Shan had stopped, but he hadn’t yet turned off the engine when Naite started.
    “Temar, you deal with that sister of yours or I’m going to seriously consider dropping her on her head four or five times,” Naite greeted them, and from the look on his face, he wasn’t joking.
    “Hello to you too,” Shan muttered, but Temar was already getting off the bike.
    “What happened?” he asked.
    “She tried ordering a whole farm’s worth of cotton seed. You put that much cotton in and you aren’t going to have any workers to pick it. That shit is miserable work, and facing a whole farm of it would make any worker worth his salt move to another farm.”
    “Oh shit. Did she—”
    “I told Young that if he even tried to fill that order that I would make it my personal mission to make sure you never paid a cent for any of it. He had no business trying to negotiate with Cyla. She doesn’t own this farm.” Naite’s hands were clenched into fists, and Shan figured that conversation had come with one or two tacit threats of a more direct variety. Naite might be a council member and one of the best workers on the planet, but his control of his temper sometimes got a little frayed.
    “But she was willing to talk to him, like she did have the authority,” Temar said wearily. Shan wished he could carry some of this burden for him, but it was Temar’s farm and Temar’s sister. Shan certainly didn’t know anything about the running of a farm. Of course, from the sounds of it, neither did Cyla.
    Naite poked a thick finger toward Temar. “Both of them need attitude adjustment. Mind you, it’s too late to change George Young’s greed, but if someone doesn’t set Cyla straight, she’s going to end up just as bad. And every time I talk to her, I get it thrown back at me that I’m a slave here.”
    Temar flinched. Naite didn’t seem too bothered by Cyla’s word choice, but then he didn’t have the same associations with slavery that Temar did. “She didn’t,” Temar said in the sort of weary tone that suggested that he fully believed she had.
    “Talk to her before I drop her in the recycler,” Naite said, and then he turned his back and strode away. A knot of workers had gathered in the potato field, but when Naite turned around, they all hurried back to their rows and started the ground probes again.
    “I can’t believe she’d do this,” Temar sighed. “Oh wait, yes I can. If the plan looks good on paper, then she’s going to believe that instead of listening to Naite. I can’t believe she threw it back at him that he’s slaved to the farm—like that means anything. He’s the one who knows how to actually run a farm.” Temar ripped off his sand veil, his voice rising with every word.
    Shan didn’t normally see Temar angry, but he understood better than most just how much a sibling could get under your skin.
    “It’s not like we don’t have bigger problems on the horizon, but no, she has to go and do this.” Without another word, Temar started for the house, his entire body tight with anger.
    Even if Temar had inherited Ben’s land to compensate him for the abuse, he hadn’t inherited Ben’s ability to work the land. Shan